Personal tools

A Secret Vice

A Secret Vice is the title of a lecture apparently held by J.R.R. Tolkien in August 1930 at an Esperanto Congress in Oxford.[1] The lecture deals with constructed languages in general, and the relation of a mythology to its language. Tolkien contrasts auxiliary languages (like Esperanto) with artistic languages constructed for aesthetic pleasure.[2]

Summary

Tolkien begins by briefly discussing Esperanto but states that the topic of his lecture rather concerns "secret" languages. As an example of such a language, he first recalls an incident where he overheard a man working on his own "secret grammar" while Tolkien was in the army in the First World War. He then continues by mentioning and analysing two constructed languages: the children's play-languages Animalic and Nevbosh. The next constructed language discussed is Naffarin, a more advanced, private language "partly overlapping the last stages of Nevbosh". Finally, Tolkien discusses the languages he created for his mythology and gives examples of his Elvish poetry (with translations in English).[2]